


Like Water

by SilverDagger



Category: Claymore
Genre: Dancing, F/F, Prompt Fic, Rachel swears a lot, Second person POV, fluff and morbid introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 03:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8430619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverDagger/pseuds/SilverDagger
Summary: Audrey and Rachel between missions, dancing in the ruin of an abandoned hall.





	

You don't dance. 

The Organization did its best to teach you how to move as a noblewoman might, with ease and fine control, but you were never good at grace, and you never needed it. Your missions have always been the same: show up, cut down any yoma or awakened in your way with as much force and efficiency as possible, and leave. It would take a bigger idiot than your handler to send you out on a job requiring more subterfuge than a blunt instrument to the head.

That man is nowhere in sight now, thank all the gods. He's not a bad one, as they go, but your skin still crawls at the thought of the bastard spying on you. So you don't think about it. You think about the sunlight falling in clear beams through holes in the roof, the once-smooth stone of a ballroom floor beneath your feet, and Audrey holding out her hand to you in invitation. If she had a gown, she'd look very much like a noblewoman herself – a ghostly one, silver-white in the quiet of this abandoned hall – but neither of you has anything to your names but armor and weaponry.

You _can't_ dance, and she bloody well knows that. Left to yourself, you'd never waste your time on it – but this matters to her. It's the sort of thing humans do, and you understand that, wanting to feel human for a while. If there's anything you can do to give her that, there's no way you're not going to.

You take her hand with a slight bow of your head, and she leads you onto the floor and demonstrates the steps – one, two, one, turn and back, in time with music that fell silent long before you were born. It's simple enough, or it should be. You try to mimic what you're shown, but for all the training they tried to knock into your head, you find yourself suddenly clumsy on your feet. Of course, remembering the steps might be easier if you weren't so aware of Audrey's hands resting at your shoulder and your hip, her warmth and her aura and her eyes – cold metal, but not flat, always fierce and bright with life. You're not sure you'll ever stop being aware of that – of her, more elegant than you but no less dangerous. Hell, she's more so, Three to your Five, subtle to your direct. It's sometimes a surprise, how little that bothers you. She pulls you a little closer, and even in the low light, you can see the flush that paints her cheeks. Your heart jumps in your chest, and you stumble, biting back a curse.

"This is stupid," you growl. "You know I can't – "

Before you can finish saying it, she laughs and pulls you into a spin, long hair and white cloak whirling out behind her. She's got a way of taking command without letting you realize she's doing it, just pulling you along with her like water sweeps a leaf into its current, and for once in your life, you don't mind being a leaf instead of a rock.

"See," she says, "it's not so difficult."

"You would say that," you counter, but you can feel yourself grinning despite your best efforts.

"You're better than you think," she says, and as far as you can tell, she isn't lying.

 _One, two, one_ , you think, _and turn, and back, and spin. Watch your feet. Don't fuck this up, Ray._

And somehow, by luck or miracle, you don't. After a circuit around the ballroom, it's not so difficult to match the pattern of Audrey's steps, or to find your way without her leading you. You're not sure what you think of it, dancing. It's not at all like a good fight, although perhaps a warrior like Audrey would say differently. It feels almost like floating, surrounded by dust and sun and crumbling stone as you move through the silence of a place cut off from time. And that's another thing that gives you the shudders when you let yourself think about it too much; you've never liked to be reminded that the world is filled with the graves of towns. You try to focus on the rhythm of the dance instead, the imagined music and Audrey light in your arms as the two of you sweep across the floor. You try to mind the present, but you can't help wondering distantly what it might have been like to set foot in this hall when the ones who owned it were still alive.

You can't imagine yourself in fine lace and gemstones, tripping around a polished floor with – hell, probably some young lord or another. It's harder than imagining yourself human. But you would have been a crofter's daughter anyway, with rough hands and dirt beneath your nails, and you don't think Audrey would have been anything different. You would have kept to your village, same as everyone who isn't a fool with a mind to die on the road, and chances are good you never would have met at all. You're not going to make judgments about _worth it_. That's a loser's game, and you wouldn't buy this moment or any other with your family's lives. But all the same, you can't help thinking that it hasn't all come out bad.

"You're thinking about something," Audrey says. Her voice is all it takes to pull you back to the present, and you almost miss another step at the teasing little quirk in her smile.

"Thinking about us," you say. Then you realize what that sounds like, and it's your turn to blush like an idiot kid. You shrug, suddenly awkward. "About this place. What it would have been like to be alive then."

Audrey seems to consider that as she leads you on one more turn about the room, looking around at the place as it is now and perhaps wondering the same as you. She slows to a stop and steps away from you, looking up at the arching ceiling, but she keeps her hand on your shoulder. 

"It would have been something," she says softly. "I would have liked to see it."

"You prob'ly dreamed of being a fine lady, eh?" you say.

"Hardly. I was too busy pushing other the children into the mud."

"I would have liked to see that, I think," you say. "Only way I could believe it."

Audrey laughs briefly at that, and then silence falls again. You don't much like it when things get too quiet. It leaves you restless, looking for something to fill up the space.

"You think there's ghosts here?" you say, elbowing her in the ribs.

"I think I don't want to stay too long after dark."

You'd never admit it, but you might agree with her. It's not that you _believe_ in ghosts and shit like that, but you're not sure that you want to test the existence or the patience of anything you can't kill by cutting off its head. And, well, however these people died – and there's never really a question of how – the least you can do is to give them some respectful distance

Still, if anything here objects to your presence, they haven't shown it yet. _Maybe ghosts get lonely,_ you think. Maybe dead places like to see some life once in a while.

And maybe you're acting like a brat just barely out of training, spinning stories for yourself like that kind of crap might make a difference to the living or the dead. But you reach out for Audrey's hand anyway, and feel her fingers close around yours, delicate despite the strength in her grip. Ghosts or not, it's good to have someone with you, if only for now.

 _No_ , you think, _not someone_. It's good to be with _her._

You'll have to set off alone soon, on to other missions and enemies, and she'll have to do the same. You know that, and you're not coward enough to try to deny it. But nightfall is a ways off yet, and the morning farther still, and what happens after that is not something you have to worry about now. You've got time.

"Hey," you say, "How about one last dance before we ditch this shithole for good?" 

She shakes her head in resigned amusement at your choice of words, but she doesn't say no, only steps out onto the floor and draws you along with her. You bow to kiss the back of her hand, and your eyes meet once, if only for a second. When she looks at you, you don't feel like a beast in human skin. You feel like yourself. 

This time, when the dance begins again, you're not thinking about anything except the moment.


End file.
